Sports greatest records that will never fall?

Thursday

Dec 26, 2013 at 11:12 AM

(Never say never? OK, but the magnitude of certain sports achievements, plus changes in the sports themselves, make it, let’s say, extremely unlikely that the marks on this top-10 list compiled by Mike DiGiovanna will ever fall.)

(Never say never? OK, but the magnitude of certain sports achievements, plus changes in the sports themselves, make it, let’s say, extremely unlikely that the marks on this top-10 list compiled by Mike DiGiovanna will ever fall.)

Following is the list:

Iron Man II

On May 29, 1982, Cal Ripken, then a 21-year-old Baltimore shortstop, sat out the second game of a doubleheader against Toronto. He would not miss another game until Sept. 20, 1998, when he voluntarily sat out the final home game of the season against the New York Yankees.

Ripken’s streak of 2,632 consecutive games played spanned more than 16 years and included that historic night of Sept. 6, 1995, when, with President Bill Clinton and Joe DiMaggio on hand, Ripken broke Lou Gehrig’s record of 2,130 straight games and took a 22-minute victory lap around Camden Yards.

Injuries, illness and the desire of managers to pace players with days off through 162-game seasons prevent most streaks from gaining much steam.

The longest active streak of 505 games — 2,127 short of Ripken — is held by new Texas first baseman Prince Fielder. To break Ripken’s record, all Fielder, 29, has to do is play in every game … for 13 more years.

Seventh heaven

Lew Alcindor passed the torch to Sidney Wicks, who passed it to Bill Walton. Those three stars and legendary coach John Wooden were the keys to UCLA’s incredible run to a record seven straight national championships and 38 consecutive NCAA tournament victories from 1967 to 1973.

No other Division I college basketball program — not Duke, Kentucky, North Carolina or Michigan State — has won more than two straight national titles. With today’s stars bolting for the NBA after one or two years in college, forcing coaches to reshuffle rosters every year or two, it’s impossible to build a UCLA-like dynasty.

Alcindor, later known as Kareem Abdul-Jabbar, Wicks and Walton remained at UCLA through their senior seasons. UCLA also needed four tournament victories to win most of those titles. Today’s NCAA champions must navigate a more grueling 68-team field and win six games.

Luck of the Irish

After securing the rights from St. Louis to the second pick of the 1956 NBA draft in a trade, Boston Celtics coach Red Auerbach persuaded the Rochester Royals, in a negotiation that included a promise that the Celtics would send the highly popular Ice Capades to Rochester, to bypass a certain 6-foot-9 All-American center with the first pick.

Rochester took Duquesne swingman Sihugo Green, and the cigar-chomping Auerbach ended up with Bill Russell, the centerpiece of a Celtics dynasty that won a record eight straight NBA titles from 1959 to 1966, beating the Lakers in the NBA Finals five times, the start of a bitter rivalry that has spanned decades.

The NBA’s collective-bargaining agreement makes it much more difficult to keep great teams together today. First-round picks who become impact NBA players can become free agents after only four years, and teams can sign their own free agents for a maximum of five years.

And penalties for teams passing the $71.7 million luxury-tax threshold are severe. A club with a $100 million payroll would owe an additional $78 million in taxes.

The Great One

Wayne Gretzky was not the biggest, strongest or fastest skater in NHL history, but his combination of skill, instincts, intelligence and ability to read the game was unrivaled. In 21 seasons, the Brantford, Canada, native amassed a record 2,857 points, almost 1,000 more than second-ranked Mark Messier (1,887).

Gretzky, who led the Edmonton Oilers to four Stanley Cup championships from 1984 to 1990, holds nine of the top 11 single-season points records, including four with 205 or more. In fact, he has more assists (1,963) than any other player has points.

The two active players closest to Gretzky are 43-year-old New Jersey Devils right wing Jaromir Jagr, who had 1,721 points before Monday, and 41-year-old Anaheim Ducks right wing Teemu Selanne, who had 1,441 points and is retiring after this season.

Ryan Express

Nolan Ryan’s consistent delivery from a strong, wiry and freakishly injury-resistant 6-foot-2, 200-pound frame produced high-octane velocity that the right-hander carried well into his 40s.

Ryan amassed a record 5,714 strikeouts in 27 years (1966-93). Only one pitcher — Randy Johnson with 4,875 — is within 1,000 strikeouts. Roger Clemens (4,672) and Steve Carlton (4,136) rank third and fourth, respectively.

To break Ryan’s record, a pitcher would have to average 228 strikeouts over 25 seasons or 286 strikeouts over 20 seasons, virtually impossible in an age when pitchers start on four days’ rest, pitch counts are closely monitored and starters rarely pitch beyond the seventh inning.

Ryan, who whiffed a modern-day record of 383 batters in 1973, holds another unbreakable record with 2,795 walks, 962 more than Carlton (1,833).

San Francisco Treat

Mississippi-raised Jerry Rice, the son of a brick mason, says he developed his strong hands working for his father, often catching bricks that were tossed two stories up by his brother.

Rice would use those hands — and his speed, instincts and route-running ability — to become the greatest receiver in NFL history, accumulating a record 22,895 yards receiving and 197 touchdowns from 1985 to 2004 and helping the San Francisco 49ers win three Super Bowls.

It didn’t hurt that Rice, who is 6,961 yards ahead of second-place Terrell Owens (15,934 yards) on the NFL’s all-time list, had two Hall of Fame quarterbacks — Joe Montana and Steve Young — throwing to him for 16 seasons.

But Rice was also huge in the clutch and was named MVP of Super Bowl XXIII against Cincinnati.

The Big Dipper

A last-place New York Knicks team was no match for Wilt Chamberlain on March 2, 1962, the hulking 7-foot-1, 275-pound Philadelphia Warriors center scoring an NBA-record 100 points in a game played in Hershey, Pa.

Chamberlain, despite being triple-teamed in the second half, made 36 of 63 shots from the field and 28 of 32 from the free-throw line, remarkable for a player who struggled so much he shot his free throws underhanded.

The closest anyone has come to the record is Lakers star Kobe Bryant, who, after scoring 81 points against Toronto in 2006, said of Wilt’s mark, "It’s unthinkable … it’s pretty exhausting to think about it."

Long live the king

Driving his famous No. 43 stock car for 34 years from 1958 to 1992, North Carolina native Richard Petty racked up 200 NASCAR wins, including the prestigious Daytona 500 a record seven times. Petty, who survived harrowing crashes in 1970, 1980 and 1988, also won a record 27 races in 1967 alone.

The driver who is second to Petty on NASCAR’s all-time list, David Pearson, retired with 105 wins. Active racer Jeff Gordon ranks third with 88 wins. Bobby Allison and Darrell Waltrip, both retired, are tied for fourth with 84 wins.

Why is Petty’s record virtually untouchable? Because the sport today is so much more competitive than it was in Petty’s era; there are more good drivers and good cars that have been aided by huge advances in technology throughout the field in any given race.

Marathon Men

John Isner and Nicolas Mahut made history by playing an 11-hour 5-minute, 183-game match over three days at Wimbledon in 2010. That was a full 4½ hours longer than the previous record match of 6 hours 33 minutes by Fabrice Santoro and Arnaud Clement at the 2004 French Open.

Two days after their match started, Isner, of North Carolina, defeated Mahut, of France, 6-4, 3-6, 6-7 (7), 7-6 (3), 70-68. The previous mark for games played was 112 between Pancho Gonzales and Charlie Pasarell in 1969 at Wimbledon. Isner and Mahut shattered that by playing 138 games — in the fifth set.

Isner said of his vanquished opponent, "The guy’s an absolute warrior. It stinks someone had to lose. To share this with him was an honor. Maybe we’ll meet again down the road, and it won’t be 70-68." They met again in the first round at Wimbledon in 2011, Isner winning in straight sets in a mere 2 hours 2 minutes.

Home run king (*)

It’s difficult to rank the records of Barry Bonds, who hit 73 home runs for the San Francisco Giants in 2001 and 762 home runs in his 22-year career, passing Mark McGwire’s single-season mark and Hank Aaron’s career mark.

The slugger was a central figure in baseball’s steroids scandal, being indicted on charges of perjury and obstruction of justice in 2007 for allegedly lying to a grand jury by testifying that he never knowingly took any illegal steroids.

Baseball’s crackdown on performance-enhancing drugs and renewed emphasis on pitching and defense will make both records difficult to eclipse, but who knows?

Major League Baseball may have to cope with an undetectable chemical era in the future, or some Ruthian-like slugger could emerge from nowhere — like Baltimore’s Chris Davis, who hit 53 home runs in 2013 — and top the single-season mark.